Deeply affecting 'Leave No Trace' is a tale of life on the fringes

By Al Alexander/For the Patriot Ledger

Sunday

Jul 1, 2018 at 1:27 PM

Dads are stubborn things; particularly those with a teenage daughter. Many assume their little girls think like them, want what they want and see what they see when staring out at a world brimming with negative influences. Will, the protagonist in Debra Granik’s gorgeous, shattering “Leave No Trace,” certainly operates like that, albeit to the extreme.

For years, he and 13-year-old Tom have lived off the grid in the lush, emerald-green forests in and around Portland, Oregon; entering civilization (if you want to call it that) only rarely to gather supplies and check in with Will’s docs at the V.A. The rest of the time is spent living off the land and being one with nature. It’s a peaceful, blissful existence -- away from TV, radio and all other distractions -- that has admirably deepened the father-daughter bond.

Watching their daily routine of work and play stirs a bit of envy in those of us who’ve sold out to the corporate world. You wish you had the nerve and fortitude to -- like them -- acquiesce to your inner Henry David Thoreau and chuck all creature comforts. In the opening minutes of her extraordinary film, Granik paints an idyllic picture laced with the reality that the world has grown too imposing to allow such an existence to continue unchecked. Will and Tom can stage all the escape “drills” they want, but it’s only a matter of time before reality crashes the party. And when it does, it fills you with fear.

You can’t imagine Will and Tom not living together, and when the government separates them, your thoughts immediately go to what’s currently occurring on the Mexican border. It feels like an amputation, an intrusion and staggering affront to freedom. In other words, Granik has you exactly where she wants you; outraged and dispirited. In other words, the perfect time to flip the switch and suddenly start seeing things from Tom’s perspective instead of Will’s. Now you’re torn and unsure, invested and praying for an outcome where father and daughter can exist together emotionally, yet physically apart.

Like she did with her Oscar-nominated “Winter’s Bone,” Granik views this metamorphosis as an unbiased observer, letting the story she again wrote with Anne Rossellini unfold slowly and organically without a hint of sentimentality. You’re the judge, you’re the jury, going back and forth over who’s right and who’s wrong; only to be surprised in the end by the realization that there are no judgments to be made. That’s the beauty of Granik as a storyteller. She twists you in moral knots and then leaves you to confront your own prejudices.

The characters here are decidedly Red State, living in tents, trailers and rundown cabins. But Granik wants you to see them not in a political light, but in a human one. She subtly asks her Blue State fans to walk a mile in her characters’ worn-out boots in a land that’s anything but equal, particularly for our shamefully neglected war veterans. Will is just one of them, but his silent battle with PTSD is an epidemic that rarely cracks the headlines. Granik champions their cries for help in deeply moving ways. But it’s Ben Foster’s haunting portrayal of Will that puts a tortured face on it.

Like his angry, vengeful bank robber in “Hell or High Water,” Foster is a human aneurysm so red and swollen you agonizingly anticipate him to burst at any second. But he never does, at least not so you can see. No, like everything else with Will, it’s all happening on the inside at the root of his damaged psyche. Yet Foster is able to let us see clearly how fighting in a nameless, unjust war has caused his mind to short circuit to the point he can no longer deal with a society moving at warp speed. We can see it, but Tom, who has known no other life can’t. At least not at first.

Now we’re in Granik’s wheelhouse of deconstructing teenage girls -- through no fault of their own -- living on the desolate outskirts of society. We saw it with Ree’s fight to save her family from her meth-cooking dad in “Winter’s Bone,” a part that put Jennifer Lawrence on the Hollywood map and earned her an Oscar nomination to boot. And I don’t think I’m going out on a line to predict the same for the magnificent Thomasin McKenzie as Tom. It’s a mind-blowing performance so full of nuance and skill that it never feels like acting.

Just watch McKenzie’s face brighten when she’s exposed to the many little things she was deprived of in the wild: a sweet boy who teaches her about training and caring for rabbits; a group of older ladies performing a flag routine in church; a song strummed on a pair of guitars; and most poignantly, a mountain woman (an outstanding Dale Dickey from “Winter’s Bone”) unassumingly taking the part of the mother Tom never had. But it’s McKenzie’s sad, longing eyes that get to you most; and watching them come alive as the movie moves forth is a source of unexpected joy.

Where does Granik find these young, superb actresses? It’s like she has a patent on it. But it’s her skill as a filmmaker that leaves you gob smacked; taking small tales about people living on the margin and making them resonate is a gift few directors possess. Paul Schrader, whose similarly themed “First Reformed” is the summer’s other major achievement, certainly has it. But Granik goes one better with her ability to find an element of unbridled joy amid the despair. “Leave No Trace” may be about a daughter’s emancipation from her needy father, but deep down it’s a story about a dysfunctional nation at a crossroads between wistfulness and wishfulness. Like Tom, it’s up to us to decide where we want to go next.